The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1887-09-10


possession almost twenty-ouc years He
has read II many times, and always With
renewed interest, and IL has never failed
10 bring before his mind an all-pervading
sense OF what "might hare bcs3i,n had it not
miscarred and fallen into the hands of
Yankee instead of the fair one intended.
The letter was in a great heap with
many others, and like all the rest had been
removed from its envelope, so that II was
impossible TO ascertain the name Of the
young lady addressed. II was written on
blue tinted paper Of unusual good quality
for Confederate manufacture; the hand
writing good, and indeed the whole make
up Of the letter was Just OF the kind most
likely to impress the mind Of young lady.
Had il reached its destination an interest
ing correspondence would certainly have
followed, and very likely a love affair, and
perhaps an engagement and marriage. May
be, however, McCauly came to Mobile, was
there during tho siege, firing at the in
vaders, and when off duty calling upon his
"unknowu friend" And may be he fell
at Spanish Fort or Blakely in defense of
his native Alabama.
Such letter ne he writes is calculated
10 set IN operation thousand ConlcCturcs,
and then It has the ring OF the true soldier
wIth-as is usual with brave men--an entire
absence OF bitter cpthets for his enemies.
In different vein is tho following,
found at the same time and yet IN the
writer's possession:
TALLAHASSEE LANDING, Dec, 20 C6l) My
Dearly Beloved Mother; What IN this
wide world is the matter with you all
that ] never hear from any OF YOU!
Have the Yankees forbidden your writ
ing and won't they allow your letters free pas
sage TO Mobile' Just four years ago we arrived
home and were together. How many events
have transplred since that time. For four
years has desolatlng war been wagedupon
our land, and oh, how many have met their
fate, and fear many more will have TO sacr-
flee their lives before the end OF the struggle
for independence. | suppose ere this you have
heard OF the battle OF Franklin, Tenn, which
was fought two or three weeks ago. II must
have been an awful fight. Our soldiers charged
their line OF breastworks and succeeded IN cap
turing o. them. IL was great slaughter and
almost drawn battle. We clam a victory,
but lost from five TO eight thousand men on
how many OF our brave, true soldiers sacrificed
their lives on their country's altar that dAyl
How many fond hopes and antlcpatons and
loved ones met their DOOM and now lie buried
in the cold soil Of Tennessee Is II not awful 10
think Of
And when those they loved, on in distant
States hear OF their deaths how sad their
hearts will be- We lost several good Generals
whose places can hardly be filled. The
Fifteenth Mississippi went into the fight with
two hundred and twenty men and lost seventy.
Loring's division thar day lost seven hundred
men, It is said the loss of line and field officers
was great.
heard from Cousin Bob not long Since He
was well and in fine spirits; he said they sot
but very little TO eat, that they would kill hog
and never clean the hair OF, and they would
get their ratlonS OF meat with the hair on and
cool; II on a stick He would make his bread
on his oil cloth and bake il on fence rail. He
has been in several fights since heard from
him. Wen, mother, the Yankees have been
pretty close TO us. They have been up on the
railroad rs far as Pollard; they destroyed the
track for some distance and then left. There
was about four hundred white men and five
hundred negroes Governor Watts has called
out the militia to drive them back. Yankee
General Sherman has evacuated Atlanta and
gone in the interior of the State; he has been
to Miledgevillc and several other towns.
No one can imagine what he intends doing:
the papers say that he is soon to be surrounded
and captured hope so, but fear he is too wide
awake to be caught in trap. The mean old
wretch wish he would be caught and hung TO
the first limb. Oh! that was man; would
be willing TO sacrifice every thing or earth and
90 ana nEut LOT my country. udliy WIN tuat
was man. How wish / could see
you all and he happy ence again on earth. Do
you hear from grandma often? How does she
and Aunt Vicky get along with the Yankcesr
Where is Howard now-in the army? Give my
love to aunty and the girls How is
Mrs. Julia Murphy My love 10 her. ] suppose
you would like TO hear something of the family.
All are well; the children grow fast; they will
soon be large enough to go TO school Hall is
M IL IN re q
smart sweet child. and so are all the rest.
How do you expect to spend your Christmas:
hope pleasantly. | expect 10 see no pleasure AT
all 1t will be very dull one here. Dear
mother. do write often TO me. and make BCcke
write too, and tell me every thing concerning
you all. | will close for this time. |
will look anxiously for letter from you.
Goodbye, dear mother; believe me your low
ing child, VICTORIA NIXON.
On one margin of the letter was written
the following: Don't never send another
letter to Nix. as they generally open
them all at that Office. Send them here
after to Lowndes-now be certain to do IT,"
This letter IS written ia 4 close hand,
upon yellow paper letter size, of better
quality than most Of the Confederate man
ufa cturc.
Like McCauley's letter, it has been in
the writer's possession twenty-one years.
and the young NiXOns, then below school
age. are now, If alive, mature men and
women; and Hall, good looking and smart
like his mothers people, il approaching
middle age Aye, the baby boy that may be
pulled at his mammals dress skirts while
she was unloading her heart to her moth
er, and wishing she were man that she
might do battle for her beloved South, and
saying bitter things Of our gallant Sher.
man-her baby boy of twenty.one years
ago very likely just came OF age in time
30 cast his first vote for Cleveland IN 1854
And his mamma, if living, notices some
gray hairs in her head, and some OF the
marks of time upon her face as she turns
to the glass. And what about 'you aH'-
that phrase so common in the South.
"Beckie," most likely long since mar
ried and is now the mother of large brood
of children that look like oar .famiiy. Good
Mrs. Julia Murphy is probably nice, fat,
old lady, who remembers all about the war
and the time of "the surrender
But Mrs Victoria Nixon has probably
attended two funerals in the past twenty
one years one not great While after the
war closed, when grandma died and was
buried at the old family burying ground,
rpaor tho p-cat liVp-nak, and the other a